Let's Watch the Home Run Derby One More Time

(Small aside before I start, which makes me wonder if this is technically an aside since the main material hasn’t started yet: Remember when I said I was going to establish some kind of posting regularity? Well, I didn’t even make it one week before falling off schedule, which actually kind of impressed me. I thought I’d at least make it a week before indifference set it. Now I know just how lazy I really am.)

Welcome to the single worst week of sports all year long. Baseball, which is just something mildly entertaining to occupy time between the end of basketball season and the beginning of football season, has taken a break from its March to November marathon. NBA free agency signings have calmed down after a furious 12 hour period in which we already knew who was going to sign where. And it’s still way too damn early to start talking about college football. I actually thought about it this past weekend and within several hours of having those thoughts Greg Hardy and Dexter McCluster were in a car wreck that put Hardy back in his protective boot for another week or so. I’m not implying that I believe in any sort of weird jinx based on positive thoughts on Ole Miss, but my point is that September through December is already going to be such a soul draining, physically destructive experience that I don’t want to add any length to it. I’m doing my best to ignore it for the next month.

So with absolutely nothing to watch over the next few days (unless you count the All-Star game, which is debatable. Although, I suppose I’ll watch since I’ve already seen Four Brothers on TNT at least six times. Now if Con Air is on tonight, that might change things. I’m always up for a good comedy.), let’s go over what you can expect to see from now until Friday night when baseball games return:

-No less than 14,982 breakdowns of the two All-Star team’s lineups. Nothing says analysis quite like mentioning that both of these lineups are loaded with talent. You think so, doctor? Wait, Eric Young, you have something else to add? Yes, that is true. The three, four and five hitters for the America League are going to be tough to get out.

-The home run derby on a seemingly constant loop. This year’s derby was probably the most enjoyable for me in recent memory. Mainly because I watched it at a bar with the sound off, which meant I didn’t hear one word from Chris Berman, Joe Morgan or Steve Phillips. A trio of more insufferable gasbags I cannot recall.

-All-Star highlights on a constant loop. This game really counts!

-A quarter of a million breakdowns of the All-Star game. Well said Fernando Vina. You’re right, the American League was able to win because they scored more runs. Hadn’t even considered that.

-Several thousand segments on what to expect in the second half of the baseball season. I agree, John Kruk. Those teams in first place right now are going to be hard to beat. And I’ll bet you’re right, we will see some of them in the playoffs. What’s that, Eric? No, I don’t want to listen to you anymore.

-Hours of trade speculation by guys who have no idea. There has to be, or there at least should be, a website that tracks baseball, football and basketball writers/TV personalities/analysts claims or reports on trades that will happen according to their sources. I want to see what percentage of these trade claims actually happened. It can’t be more than 10 percent. And the site needs a really detailed archive. For instance, we could go back to July of 2008 and see that one of ESPN’s baseball guys said his source told him that the Braves were trading Mark Teixeira to the Angels for Casey Kotchman, a bag of balls, a minor league pitcher and a turd sandwich. Then we could all laugh at the ridiculous….oh, wait. That actually happened.

I’m sure I’ve left some a few things out, and, if so, go ahead and file those under unwatchable with the list above. Could you say that again, TBS? Yes, I am interested in watching Sahara again. Very interested.

Finally, An Update

My apologies for the recent bout of ass-draggery, but chalk it up to the long weekend and that I receive exactly zero dollars for the incoherence in which you read here. That of course means I'm lazy and chose to do other crap than sit in front of my computer and type. So there. Anyway, I do have an announcement of sort pertaining to posting around here. I am going to do my best to establish some posting regularity on the Beast. Ideally, I'll be putting something new up for every Monday, Wednesday and Friday (assuming none of those are involved in a holiday or long weekend). I'm pretty sure I've said this before and you can see how well I stuck to it. Nevertheless, I will make every effort possible to stick to that schedule. Someone please remind of this next week when I go six days between posts.

A couple of thoughts from the long weekend...

I know it's hard to feel sorry for someone who makes or has made millions of dollars, but I couldn't help myself when I watched Andy Roddick in the post-match ceremony of the men's final at Wimbledon. Roddick had just played as well as he could play (other than the last few points of the final game) and still lost to Roger Federer. And you could almost see him, sitting in his chair staring blankly into space, realizing he may never have what it takes to beat Federer. For the record, I hate, I mean HATE, when writers or announcers try to tell you exactly what an athlete is thinking during a game or right as the game ends, so I have no idea if that's what he was thinking. But you couldn't deny seeing the devastation and heartbreak written on his face.

I'll be interested to see how he responds to losing not just this match, but the fashion in which he lost it. Knowing that probably for the rest of his tennis career when it really counts, he simply cannot beat two guys: Federer and Nadal (that is if Nadal ever bounces back from his knee problems, which seem to be strangely glossed over by the tennis media. Haven't his knees been bothering him for several years now? I'd be a little worried since they don't appear to be getting better). That realization had to become pretty clear on Sunday. Personally, I don't think I'd go outside for like three weeks if I had lost on Sunday . But then again, I'm pretty weak-minded and live my competitive mindset vicariously though 18-22 year old college football players. So we see who has the real problem.

I hope that poor bastard gets over it.

Finally, switching gears to a much sadder story, the Steve McNair murder. I don't feel the need to either pile on the morality or speculative train like seemingly everyone else in the free world, so I'll not be offering the same opinion you've heard since the details starting coming out on Saturday and Sunday. I did however want to try to explain why this bothered me, and potentially those also from Mississippi, more than I thought it would. Of course, since I'm so selfish, it only bothered me in a way that directly affected me. I suppose I should be more upset that a wife no longer has a husband or that four kids no longer have a dad, but forgive me for my selfishness.

When you grow up in Mississippi (I spent the first 25 years of my life there), you put up with people outside the state constantly taking a big, fat dump on it. People in entertainment and media, those state ranking reports that regularly have Mississippi at the bottom and even just people you meet are always there to let you know what the rest of the country and world thinks of your state. Certainly a great deal of it is deserved as Mississippi has more problems than I care to list in the space here. But what all these people and reports rarely acknowledge is that, although the state is troubled, it has some pretty great parts and people to it. And Mississippians take great pride in those people and places because they, the people and places, create rare moments of positive attention for the state.

I don't know Steve McNair. Other than what other people say about him, I have no idea what he was like outside the game of football. But I can tell you he was great for Mississippi. He, along with other athletes like Walter Payton, Jerry Rice, Archie Manning and, yes, even Brett Favre (as you know, I'm not a fan, but he is most certainly good for the state), was someone all Mississippians could point to and say, "Look, here's something special from Mississippi." Not to be overly dramatic (although it may be too late for that now), but it was almost as if the guys mentioned above, and there are plenty of non-athletes too, represented each resident of the state as they performed in their respective professions. And we, even though we didn't know or will ever know these guys personally, always had a sense of pride whenever they succeeded because it felt like we were a part of something special.

To me, that kind of a close relationships, even though it's a one-way relationship, is normally found between fans of a team and its players. But it's pretty amazing when it happens between an entire state and its more famous native sons who aren't a part of a singular team. And I think that relationship developed in Mississippi because of the closeness of the state, both geographically and socially, and what we, as Mississippians, have all put up with our entire lives, which gives us a common bond. It's sort of like (and I'm stealing the following illustration from someone, but I can't remember who said this. My apologies to that person.) when you go through a tough experience with people you don't know, like a really hard class in college. The experience of making it through the class brings you together and you're forever connected to those people. And even though you don't really know them, you could run into them later in college and always talk about how tough that class was. That's what Mississippians have with each other. We all share, no matter who we are, what it's like to grow up in a connected place like Mississippi.

Mississippi is not a particularly big state in terms of area (31st in the U.S.) and its population is just under three million (32nd in the U.S.). If you were to name a town in the state, my guess is that you could come up with someone who lived or had lived there, and if not, you could use that degrees of separation game and have someone named within two degrees of you. So, for instance, when the story of McNair's death broke on Saturday, you, in just three phone calls, could have been talking to a friend of a friend of a friend who lived in Mount Olive and asked them for their reaction to the news. It's an extremely loose, yet tight-knit place (if that makes any sense). That's why when I found out about McNair's death I felt like we had just lost "one of us." Steve McNair and the rest of Mississippi could relate to one another because we were all raised in the same state, even though all of our upbringings were different. And it sucks to have lost one of us, especially one who was so great for and to Mississippi.

The SEC's Most Mediocre Coach

Now that the Lakers removed the NBA from our list of sports to watch, leaving only baseball for the next two months, the sporting world enters the period in which anything, and I mean anything, remotely interesting become a much bigger story than it actually should be. For instance, one of the top stories on ESPN's website as I write this is a blurb about Michael Phelps being nominated for four ESPYs. No one outside of the ESPN self-promotion machine or Phelps’ mom gives a crap about that story. But because you can't have seven baseball stories as a top stories, we have ourselves a Michael Phelps story that doesn’t involve drugs or Las Vegas dancers.

This is also the period of time (and it started when the NBA playoffs reached its second round) where college football fans, at least SEC fans (I'm assuming it happens other places, but I can only keep up with so much), begin to create all sorts of lists to pass the time until late August. In the past few weeks, I've seen lists that rank the top 30 players in the SEC, what each team needs in order to have a good year and, of course, a medley of best/worst lists that cover just about every topic one can imagine. And because there are so many lists that are so similar, they all run together and basically repeat the same information over and over again.

So with looking for a fresh idea in mind, I have elected to undertake the task of identifying the most mediocre coach in the SEC. Anyone can rattle off who they consider to be the top three or worst three coaches in the league, but to consider who really is 100% blah in their coaching performances takes some effort (which is a rare thing on the Belly of the Beast).

First off, a couple of ground rules I developed. One, record isn't the only thing that matters. That would be too easy. And two, potential, talent and resources weigh heavily in my thinking, all of which cannot accurately be measured, thus leaving this list open to ridicule with no statistical evidence to back it up.

The first thing we need to do is weed out the non-contenders. Automatically, we have to toss out all the coaches who have never coached in the SEC or have only spent one year in the league. We don't know how bad, good or just plain average these guys are. Those restrictions eliminate Dan Mullen, whose slew of retread assistant coaches could have him in contention for this title in a few years, Lane Kiffin, who will certainly find himself on hundreds of "worst" lists by the end of season one, Gene Chizik, who still can't believe he transformed a 5-19 stint at Iowa State into the Auburn job, and Bobby Petrino, who spent the last year with Casey Dick running his offense. These guys are out.

Second, we need to get rid of the guys who would be considered in the "best" group of coaches. Urban Meyer (although a trained monkey could win nine games at Florida every year, but he has won big everywhere he’s been) and Nick Saban headline this group, and I think you have to throw in Houston Nutt on the level right below them. He's not Saban or Meyer and you can argue his SEC record of 47-41 is pretty mediocre, but my overall impression of his work at Arkansas, a state with little high school football talent, was he always did more with less. Eight bowl games and two trips to Atlanta. Plus, what he did with Ole Miss last year really strengthens his case to be considered in the top tiers and thus eliminated from mediocrity.

Looking at his record, I suppose it's hard to leave Les Miles out of the best group (22-10 SEC record, one national title and one SEC title in four years), but there's no way in good conscience I can include him in the "best" or even the “worst” category, for which an argument could probably be made. Les gets his own category, which will be called "lucky bastard who inherited great talent and gets away with every dumb decision he's ever made (except this past season)." So he also is eliminated from the competition.

And our last omission is Bobby Johnson of Vanderbilt. It's hard to judge someone when they're coaching Vanderbilt. He's made them competitive in many games, lost some really bad ones and lost many he should have won. I have no idea if any of that is related to coaching or just lack of talent. Or you could just argue that it's Vanderbilt and it all sucks. Whatever the reason, it’s way too confusing to attempt to break it down so he's eliminated.

That leaves us with our three main candidates: Rich Brooks, Steve Spurrier and Mark Richt. Year in and year out Richt falls short of expectations, but never truly has a bad year in the eyes of his school. Every year there’s some hype that says this will finally be the year Spurrier puts it together for a big year at South Carolina, but he never quite gets there. And in the case of Brooks, who, after a rough start at Kentucky, has consistently nailed the average season. In the words of George Costanza, these guys are producing results right in the meaty part of the curve. Not showing off, not falling behind.

First up for debate is Kentucky coach Rich Brooks. In recent years, it seems as though Kentucky has gone 7-5 every season, which, other than 6-6, is one of the true signs of mediocrity. Turns out, here’s Kentucky’s regular season record under Brooks since 2006: 7-5, 7-5, 6-6. But in all three years, they did win their bowl games to get to improve to 8, 8 and 7 wins, respectively. That, my friends, is average.

However, as I mentioned before, records aren’t the only determining factor in this quest. Looking closer at Kentucky, they have more talent than maybe only Vanderbilt, who beat them 31-24 last season, and possibly Mississippi State, who they beat 14-13 in 2008. And the state of Kentucky isn’t exactly a recruiting hotbed. Expectations each year hover between the six and eight win mark. Well, at least I imagine that’s what the Kentucky fans who realize there is another sport other than basketball think. So with those expectations, results and talent level, it would appear that Rich Brooks is doing exactly what its expected of him, which means he’s not so mediocre. Plus, considering he took over a Kentucky program hit with NCAA probation and had won only 11 games in the three years before the got there, he’s done a good job at bringing Kentucky out of a hole.

Looking at their schedule from the past three years (I didn’t look at the previous three years because they were so bad), here’s a list of the SEC teams they’ve beaten:

Ole Miss
Mississippi State (2)
Vanderbilt (2)
LSU
Arkansas (2)
Georgia

The biggest non-conference wins:

Louisville (2)
A collection of directional and Sun Belt schools

That’s a solid collection of victories over average to bad teams with two upsets (LSU and Georgia) thrown in. Tennessee and South Carolina are noticeably absent from that list, considering Kentucky plays them every year, and those two teams haven’t been exactly tearing it up since 2006. All of this means that Rich Brooks has feasted on bad teams, had his share of wins against fellow average teams and has pulled off a couple of upsets. Normally, that would indicate that Brooks is doing what a mediocre coach does. Beats the bad teams, goes around .500 versus other average teams and wins a few games against far superior teams.

But, given the resources, talent level and history surrounding Kentucky football, can you really say Brooks has done a mediocre job? It would be ridiculous to argue that he’s done an outstanding job (can’t beat South Carolina, a team not that far ahead of Kentucky, and hasn’t been able to pick off Tennessee when they’ve been down), but it’s not a stretch to say he’s done a good job. He coaching at a school where he’ll always be second fiddle to basketball, plays in an average stadium in an uninspiring environment and has no real talent base with which to feed his program. And despite all of that against him, Brooks has gone to and won three straight bowl games.

There’s little to no chance Brooks will ever get Kentucky to Atlanta as long as Florida, Georgia and Tennessee have pulses. But, to his credit, you won’t find Kentucky consistently getting smacked around and challenging Vanderbilt for sixth in the SEC East. He’s taken a less-than-ideal coaching situation at a non-football school and made something out of it, which doesn’t make him so mediocre.

Now comes probably the most complicated man on the list: South Carolina’s Steve Spurrier. Earlier in his career at Florida, such an inclusion on this list would have led to a horde of angry men and women in jorts and tank tops throwing hair product, earrings and fake Oakley sunglasses at anyone who would suggest this idea. But unfortunately for Spurrier, South Carolina isn’t Florida. While he has brought winning to South Carolina, a place that hasn’t really ever seen consistent winning, it hasn’t been as successful of a return to the SEC as many predicted.

At a glance, Spurrier’s records at South Carolina have been straight up mediocre. Starting in 2005 and running through last year, he’s gone 7-5, 8-5, 6-6 and 7-6, respectively. In the previous four years from 2004 and before, the Gamecocks went 6-5, 5-7, 5-7 and 9-3. Other than Lou Holtz stumbling into a 9-3 season, Spurrier has improved, although not tremendously, the consistency of football at South Carolina.

If you check a little further into South Carolina’s history, you’ll find it’s much bleaker than you could ever imagine. Since 1892 when they started playing football, they’ve compiled a LOSING record of 528-529-44. And in those years, the school has won 10 and nine games only ONCE each. Once!!! Lou Holtz, responsible for the nine-win season, won just 33 games and had three winning seasons in the six years before Spurrier arrived. Even worse than that, before Holtz got there, the football team won just 41 games DURING THE 1990s (although it was Holtz who threw up an 0-11 season in 1999).

As you can see, Spurrier is trying to win at a place that has had very little success. In fact, Spurrier is the first coach at South Carolina since World War II to not post a losing record (a guy named J.P. Moran coached only one year in 1943 and posted a 5-2 record). Even though he hasn’t won big, he’s already accomplished something most South Carolina fans have never been alive to see.

Although he finds himself in a state that traditionally is pretty strong in terms of high school football talent, Spurrier is fighting a recruiting battle against some of the other big SEC schools, ACC schools and 107 years of bad to mediocre football. He’s got the facilities and loyal fanbase that can match up with other schools, but the name Steve Spurrier doesn’t mean the same thing in 2009 as it did in 1999 and can’t cover up the stink of the school’s football history.

His coaching history has shown that if he has the players, Spurrier can beat everybody. Of course, part of being a coach in college football is also being a recruiter, which is something Spurrier has not always been highly motivated to do. And although its been reported that Spurrier has put much more time and effort into recruiting, he hasn’t landed some guys that really stand out. Certainly he’s increased the talent level, but he’s been missing what talking heads like to call difference makers, especially at quarterback.

His ability to increase the talent level yet not having some superstar players is reflected in the Gamecocks’ performance on the field. He’s 1-3 against Florida and Georgia (but he does seem to play Georgia close every year), undefeated against Kentucky and is 2-2 against Tennessee. But here are some records that really surprised me:

Auburn 0-2
Arkansas 1-3
LSU 0-2
Vanderbilt 2-2

Much like Rich Brooks, Spurrier has lived off of beating bad teams, going around .500 against similar teams and has a couple of upsets against much better teams. But unlike Brooks, Spurrier has been much more competitive than his record indicates. Since 2005, Spurrier’s record is 28-22 and Brooks’ 26-24. But, of Spurrier’s 22 losses, only six could be considered what I call a blowout, a loss by more than three scores (17 points). While of Brooks’ 24 losses, 13 were by more than 17 points.

In Spurrier’s time at South Carolina, he has increased the talent level, producing teams that are good enough at times to play with anyone, but are often wildly inconsistent and aren’t good enough to get away with bringing their “C” game. Obviously, some of that inconsistency has to fall on Spurrier, but you’ll find that just about every team in all sports goes through “C” game times. What sets Spurrier above mediocrity is that he’s actually brought competitive football for four straight years to a place that has a lengthy history of being bad at football. He gives those fans who have been eating crap for the past 107 years yet still fill the stadium a reason to think they’re going to win each game. I don’t know if we’ll ever see Steve Spurrier back in Atlanta, but he’s putting South Carolina in a position that, if the perfect storm were to arise, they’d at least have a chance, which is more than has ever been done there.

Now we come to Mark Richt, the man who might spark the most outrage or dissent over being called a mediocre coach. After all, he owns a career 82-22 overall record and a 46-18 record in the SEC, two SEC titles and three BCS bowl game appearances. Plus, his road record is something insane like 30-4. But as I said earlier, the records don't tell the whole story. And if you look closely, you’ll discover that Mark Richt is the most mediocre coach in the SEC.

At Georgia, Richt sits in one of the richest areas of the country in terms of high school talent. His program is the only major one in the state (sorry, Georgia doesn't compete with Georgia Tech for recruits) and he regularly cleans up in in-state recruiting. So his team is made up of the best players in one of the best states for recruiting. Throw in a well-funded athletic department, a 92,000-seat stadium and a huge alumni base and the guy is sitting on a pile of nearly limitless resources.

Outside of Georgia in the SEC, only LSU and Florida have all of those luxuries (A case could be made for Alabama, but with Auburn being in the state, they don’t have complete control of it just yet. Another year or two of Gene Chizik and they might move into this group). And since Richt’s arrival at Georgia, LSU and Florida have both won two national titles. Richt’s best two finishes were Sugar Bowl wins over Florida State and Hawaii. And we shouldn’t forget about the Sugar Bowl against West Virginia where Richt’s team lost to a far inferior team (Georgia was a 14 point favorite) and allowed the Big East to gain entry into the national television scene (Seriously, he’s directly responsible for South Florida once being ranked number two.)

And of course there are the head-to-head records. Against LSU and Florida, Richt has gone a combined 5-8, which includes an awful 2-6 against Florida. Yes, he does have a winning record against LSU, 3-2, but take away his wins over the overwhelmed Les Miles and he’s just 1-2 (to his credit he has never lost to Les Miles) against the Tigers. Even against rivals Tennessee and Auburn, both teams that are usually not nearly as talented as Georgia, he’s produced just 5-3 records against each.

The point of all these numbers and comparisons is that Richt has just as much talent and as many resources as LSU and Florida but never produces the same results. He’s got a great record, been to some great bowl games, but when it comes time to win a game that will make or define a season, he hasn’t been very good. Instead, he’s made a career out of beating the inferior teams in the SEC. And that’s what mediocre coaches with great talent and resources around them do. They beat the teams they should beat, occasionally get upset by one of them (which also happens to good coaches) and struggle to beat teams just as good as they are. When teams with equal talent and resources face each other, good and great coaches win, and Mark Richt has proven throughout his time at Georgia that he is not one of those coaches.

Not Working for the Weekend

Remember earlier this week when I mentioned I was working on an idea that is taking way too long to finish? Well, it still isn't finished. This whole thing has turned into a Waterworld of sorts. Huge buildup, budget blown apart, way behind schedule and I can only imagine the colossal disappointment when it finally makes its way into the public eye. Only the difference between Waterworld and my idea in the works is that there is no money involved (just time), the public eye is only like 20 people and Kevin Costner isn't hovering around making sure I spell his last name correctly on the check.

Plus, it's been so damn hot the past 10 days, I'm trying to do as little activity as possible, and that includes using my brain. Small aside: We're not yet to July and the heat index for the past ten days has been clipping along anywhere from 100 to 110. Looking at the next few days and today, our highs here in Memphis are 101, 101 and 95. As sorry as I feel for myself and everyone else, my real sympathy lies with my house's air conditioner. I'm treating it like Dusty Baker treats young pitchers. It's blasting icy cold air 23 hours a day while I sit on the couch wearing my wrist bands, spinning a toothpick in my mouth and thinking about the time I once had Kerry Wood throw 314 pitches in a single game.

(Back to whatever I was talking about.)
So, since heat is so miserable, I wanted to give you a post today that didn't require any thinking to prevent any possibility of you making yourself hotter. And no one likes active learning/thinking anyway. Spoon fed is the way to go. I present a few YouTube clips for your passive learning/thinking pleasure.

I emailed this to a few of you, but it's always worth another 50 views. Honestly, I can't stop watching this.


Even though this video is almost a year old, I'm sure those involved were arguing over beer because it was so damn hot in Memphis. How do I know they were arguing over beer? An eyewitness tells all.


How about another video from the great city of Memphis? If you're a local auto dealer, THIS is how you should make a commercial. My only regret over this video is that the Lil' Wayne promo at the end wasn't fully recorded.


And because these never get old, it's another news reporter being terrorized by an animal (or whatever a lizard is considered). My apologies for the music at the begining and end.


In honor of Manny Ramirez's future return to the Dodgers and restoring the baseball life of Andre Ethier (member of my fantasy team), here's an interview from last season he gave with fellow Dodger Angel Berroa. This video adds legitimacy to the theory that it had to be impossible for him to remember take his steroids and fertility drugs on a regular basis.


And finally, I feel it's necessary to mention the United States' soccer win over world number one Spain on Wednesday. So here are the highlights packaged in just under three minutes. And, as a bonus, the announcers are Spanish because it's always more fun to listen to guys scream in Spanish.

What Didn't Happen Over the Weekend

Normally on Mondays or Tuesdays, I like to take a look at what happened over the weekend. But considering the only thing that happened this weekend was the playing of multiple baseball games, I decided that wouldn’t be as compelling and rich as the readers of the Beast demand. So with that in mind, I introduce a new segment that will hopefully become a regular feature (which all depends on how motivated I am) around here. As the title clearly notes, I call it “What Didn’t Happen Over the Weekend.” Instead of covering all sports like the usual weekend recap, this first attempt will be an SEC only edition.

Good news Tennessee fans, your head coach, Lane Kiffin, did not rack up any new NCAA rules violations. He managed to accomplish this by not picking up any telephones, turning on a computer, opening his mouth or making any sort of hand gestures. For safety, he was placed in that contraption the FBI put Hannibal Lecter in when they took him to meet that senator or governor in Memphis. I don’t think he’ll bite off anyone’s face in order to start committing more rules violations, but it should be known the potential is always there.

Actually, there are two pieces of good news for Tennessee fans. Ed Orgeron survived the weekend without challenging the entire Tennessee football team to a fight. If this were early August, he may not have made it. However, he did tell all the graduate assistants that if he had to do it again, he’d still go for the fourth and one against Mississippi State.

Alabama did not get down on its knees and praise God for the slap on the wrist from the NCAA. Instead, they have elected to appeal the punishment handed down. Whether they are aware of it or not, they have also elected to have the NCAA up in their shit for the next five years. Not that anything will come of it, it’s Alabama.

Ole Miss signee Bobby Massie (and future left tackle) did not get into school. There was no indication he would, as he appears to be on the same timetable as Brent Schaeffer was, but it would have been nice.

Reports out of Starkville confirm that quarterback Tyson Lee did not grow four inches and is still 5’8”. That shouldn’t matter once Dan Mullen sends him to the bench after a three interception effort against Auburn, but until then I hope he retained his speed.

There is a bit of bad news for Tennessee. Turns out they’re not paying just one person to coach strength and conditioning. They still have to pay former strength coach Mark Smith his salary (unless he gets another job) and also have to pay Ed Orgeron’s hire, Aaron Ausmus. Ausmus, who comes from the football juggernaut of North Texas, was Orgeron’s guy at Ole Miss and also spent time at Southern Cal with both Kiffin and Orgeron. This also adds more steam to the rumors that Ed Orgeron has much more influence and power than he should ever be allowed to have.

Urban Meyer did not become any less insufferable in the past few days. All indications are that he is sharpening his poser steely glare by practicing in front of a mirror every day for two hours. He is also planning to dazzle the college football media with a revolutionary idea that he wants to be the team that scores the most points this season.

I’m sure he tried, but Auburn coach Gene Chizik did not improve his 5-19 career head coaching record. Unfortunately, that record won’t move until September. In a related story, Iowa State fans did not stop walking around with looks of pure joy.

And finally, South Carolina quarterback Stephen Garcia did not do anything over the weekend that embarrassed himself, his family, team, coaches, school or the Columbia community. Unfortunately for him, he still has another summer school session and each day he walks by that professor’s car it gets harder and harder to keep those keys in his pocket.